Currently, a large part of the world is shifting towards a knowledge based economy, where technology and computer coding skills reign supreme. Will your students be prepared to enter this new economy? This shift is dynamic and the pace of change is unbelievably fast. To succeed in the knowledge economy, your students need skills like coding and programming to be second nature. So what do students do when these skills aren’t being taught in the classroom?

First of all, young people are taking learning into their own hands. Using books and web-based resources, these kids are excelling in the production of websites, apps, and programs. It comes easy to them, and this might scary for you, their teacher. For example, Thomas Suarez who is just reaching his early teens already has his own company and two iPhone apps for sale.

Teachers, are you tired of sending and resending email attachments, forgetting files on your home computer, and constantly deleting large emails to make room for more? Then read on! The solution to your problems = online sharing. Read the rest of this entry »

Copyright laws are something you, as a teacher, are probably familiar with. But, what about your students? Students who are consumed by digital media and Internet sharing need to be aware of the laws surrounding the material they copy. You can help your students understand copyright by talking about it anytime they might need to copy information, and by setting a good example yourself. In this post I will help to bring you up to speed on recent changes to copyright laws so that you and your students can become one with copyright.

Development of copyright laws has historically depended on information of the analog world, where print was usually the only means for sharing knowledge. Copying print materials can be difficult, time consuming and expensive. Usually it results in decreased quality from the original work. During these times it was difficult to copy others work. Someone would probably notice you trying to photocopy an entire book. So it made sense to buy the original copy.

An important part of any educational curriculum in the digital age is the discussion of privacy, or lack thereof. The concept of a digital footprint is critical to discuss with students, especially if you plan to incorporate social media into your lessons.

Whenever I think about privacy and the Internet, the statement used by police comes into my head: “Everything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.” For our purposes this phrase might be changed to something more like “everything you say can be used against you by anyone using the Internet.”